This invention relates to a vehicle headlamp fitted with a shade.
Many vehicle headlamps are often fitted with shades in order to avoid causing oncoming vehicle drivers and pedestrians to be blinded by the glare of headlamps.
As shown in FIG. 5, a shade 2 is arranged so that direct light from a light bulb 4 is shielded by a shielding cap 2a. When a reflector 6 has a reflective surface 6a extending forward from the upper end edge of the reflector 6 as shown in FIG. 5, shielding of direct light incident on the upper wall surface 6b from the light source bulb 4 is desirable in view of preventing the generation of stray light as a glaring source.
Therefore, it has heretofore been contrived to block light incident on the upper wall surface 6b by forming the upper end portion 2b of the shielding cap 2a so that the upper end portion 2b may be extended backward further than the other portion as shown in FIG. 5.
In a case where the reflective surface of the reflector is constituted of a plurality of reflective elements, however, the reflective surface has irregularities on a reflective element basis. Consequently, only forming the rear end edge of the upper end portion of the shielding cap into a simply curved shape as before cannot stop the incidence of light on the upper wall surface 6b without impeding the incidence of light on the reflective surface 6a.
In other words, a problem develops from the fact that if it is attempted to prevent the generation of such stray light in the conventional vehicular headlamp, utilization luminous flux (the amount of light incident on the reflective surface 6a) may largely be decreased, whereas if it is attempted not to greatly decrease the utilization luminous flux, a large amount of stray light may be generated.